'Lady Sings the Blues' and what might have been for black film

Re-watching Lady Sings the Blues, the excellent though apparently wildly inaccurate 1972 Billie Holiday biopic, is something of a bittersweet experience because it reminds me of what might have been when it comes to black cinema at the time.

The film, produced by Paramount, is bolstered by beautiful costumes, sets, music -- and a cast to die for. Diana Ross, against the odds, gives a riveting and very physically demanding performance as the drug addicted but soulful Holiday. Billy Dee Williams oozes sex appeal as her love interest (although the scripts calls for him to be uncomfortably patronizing at times) and Richard Pryor is heartbreaking as her loyal "Piano Man."

Along with the same year's black-themed Sounder, Lady Sings the Blues scored a handful of Oscar nominations (including a richly deserved one for Ross) and seemed to be indicating a renaissance of classy, thoughtful black movies.

Unfortunately, though, most of the decade was swamped with blaxploitation, which aside from some brilliant sidekicks and the occasionally iconic movie (Pam Grier's Coffy, for instance) -- were largely a waste of their stars' talents and now only serve to provide kitsch value.

The black filmmaking boom that Lady Sings the Blues signaled didn't really come into fruition until the late 1980s and the movie stars, for the most part, never lived up to their potential either. Ross followed up her galvanizing performance here with the campy Mahogany and the cult hit The Wiz, whose most ardent defenders must admit she was miscast for. Williams, of course, gave an iconic performance as Lando Calrissian in two blockbuster Star Wars sequels, but his career post-Lady Sings the Blues was sadly more misses than hits.

Billy Dee Williams' memorable megawatt smile

Pryor showed in this film, and later in 1978's classic Blue Collar, that he could be a really compelling dramatic actor if he wanted to be, but he largely stuck to broad comedic roles. And although he struck gold in at least two of his pairings with the great Gene Wilder, his movie career was largely middle of the road.

Motown, the music studio, came to Hollywood as Williams once put it, "not to make black movies but to make movies with black stars," but sadly, the financial failure of The Wiz prematurely ended that dream in the late '70s.

Still, there is much to look back on with awe. Lady Sings the Blues is romantic melodrama at its finest. While Ross has never been hailed as a supreme vocalist, she brilliantly approximates Holiday's unique singing voice and the music always serves as a deep commentary on the story. And her chemistry with Williams is undeniable.

The scene where she gets booed for not accepting tips in a nightclub (in a crude manner that I won't spoil here) and he offers her his money in kindness with the smooth as silk line: "Do you want my arm to fall off?" -- followed by a buoyant rendition of "Them There Eyes" -- is one of my favorite sequences in any film, period.

Diana Ross as Billie Holiday

The movie also does an incredibly effective job of portraying drug abuse. Scenes of people strung out can feel very artificial if they're not done right. Here, Ross does a phenomenal but subtle job of conveying the varied stages of addiction. Her large expressive eyes are in particular used to great effect as is her incredibly petite frame.

Also, the film does not shy away from race. Holiday endures segregation and encounters with the Ku Klux Klan. She is repeatedly rejected for more inferior singers who happen to be white. And she seems perpetually doomed even when her career appears to be on an upswing. That's part of why the final shot of Williams watching her perform at Carnegie Hall is so powerful. His expression of joy gives way to a sense of wariness. It's only a matter of time until she falls again.

Don't let that downbeat tone dissuade you from seeing the movie though. It's one of the great musical biographies of all time and evidence of what black cinema can be when it's realized at its finest.